Landholders' perceptions of farm forestry: overview report

This document provides an overview of a project conducted to investigate the perceptions of landholders in the Northern Rivers Region of New South Wales to commercially-oriented farm forestry. This project was undertaken for the Northern Rivers Regional Plantations Committee with funding supplied by the Federal Department of Primary Industries and Energy under the Farm Forestry Program. The project was conducted in two parts. A questionnaire was used in the first part of the project. The responses to the questionnaire were analysed to assess the relationships between the topic areas listed below, and to identify groups within the community with different reasons for planting and managing trees that could form the basis for developing and targeting publicly funded farm forestry assistance programs. The full report of the results of this part of the project may be found in Specht and Emtage (1998). Topics covered in the questionnaire survey included: (i) the reasons landholders have for planting and managing trees on their land; (ii) perceived restrictions to planting and managing trees; (iii) the types of incentive or assistance schemes that would be most valuable to aid participation in farm forestry activities; (iv) information sources used to assist land management decisions; (v) landholders’ tree planting behaviour; and (vi) selected socio-economic characteristics of landholders and their landholdings. The second part of the project, reported in this document, consisted of telephone interviews with respondents who volunteered to be contacted further. These interviews were designed to validate the results of the first part of the project, and to extend and further explore the potential of farm forestry and the factors constraining its development in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales. The utility and relevance of existing theories of rural sociology and decision-making are examined. An overview of the information and understanding gained in the project is provided, and recommendations for action proposed